Masterpiece
by keeponwritin
Summary: She dug herself a hole of bitter cutting contentment. Sometimes, it's hard to crawl out... [BorderlineR material.]


[A/N: I don't own I don't own I don't own Ellie. Oh, pity me.  
  
I know, I know. How cliche, an Ellie fic to an Evanescence song. But hey, there are easier ways out. I could've picked and just had Ellie cut herself a lot. And that's certainly no fun. Instead, a bit of a challenge. Enjoy.  
  
Background info: Ellie's in 12th grade in this work of fiction.]  
  
------  
  
For me, self-mutilation had been an artform. A form of quiet self-expression. The incidents of cutting flowed freely. When I needed that release, it was there to guide me, the letting of blood symbolizing the release of my emotions. I did it when I needed it. Just like any artist.  
  
_I linger in the doorway  
Of alarm clock screaming monsters calling my name  
Let me stay  
Where the wind will whisper to me  
Where the raindrops as they're falling tell a story  
  
_Another Friday night at home. Nowhere to go, no one to talk to. My senior year at Degrassi was coming to a close, but my work was not yet finished. I had listened to Paige that day, chattering idly in the girls' bathroom, and talking about her summer plans. Even Ash had caught this worry-free bug, and spoke like school was over already. Not that I listened. I'd stopped listening years ago. To Paige, to Ashley, to everyone. Silent screams for help I cried out daily, and no one ever listened. No one bothered to. It was just Ellie. She was _always_ like this. Even Paige, who made her feeble attempts two years ago, never truly cared. If someone cared, they would listen. They wouldn't push me towards the counseling and let people who thought they were professionals sit and psychoanalyze me. There was NOTHING wrong with me. I went to school, I did my homework, I talked to my mom, I worked at my internship, I wrote for the Grapevine. Why couldn't people just understand that cutting was part of me? Others listened to music, wrote in journals, painted, all to distract themselves from life. And I cut. What was so wrong with that? Why was it such a taboo to feel the need to do this to myself? It was my body, why couldn't I just do what I wanted with it? People would say the cutting wasn't the problem, it was my depression. But the cutting was the solution to my depression! Why was that so hard to understand..._  
  
In my field of paper flowers  
And candy clouds of lullaby  
I lie inside myself for hours  
And watch my purple sky fly over me  
  
_I laid completely still on my rough bedroom floor. I hovered over a blank piece of paper. The Grapevine had asked me to write my final editorial for the paper before graduation. The topic was acceptance. If and how people of different ethnicities, races, and sexual preferences intermingled in the halls of Degrassi. I laughed dryly in Liberty's face as she handed me the topic. There was plenty of ethnic and racial intermingling; that was not the problem. Her mind suddenly froze in its backtracking, as her breaths became heavier and more frequent. Her mind traced its way back into time...  
  
By eleventh grade, it had stopped bothering me. I'd gotten over it and just learned to deal. I'd learned to accept it for what it was. So I had no problem that night with going out with Marco and Dylan, just for some dinner and then to a small local club for teens. Dylan was a freshman in college at that time, and the two of them rarely got to see each other. So when dinner was finished and we were heading over to the club, Dylan asked if I would drive. As I looked in my mirror at the backseat to see them locked in a fervent kiss, I understood why. But my long-gone crush on Marco rose to the surface. I had never had a boyfriend before. Sean and I had this brief fling a couple years ago. (Silly me, confusing a few cutesy compliments for love.) But that was it. And here I was, only having my permit, supposed to have someone over 18 in the passenger seat, and I was driving with two guys in my backseat. And when we got to the club, it only continued, leaving me to sit by myself and internally cry.  
  
An hour or two had passed before I saw Dylan walked towards the bathroom, and Marco walk towards me. He smiled in his warm, congenial way, and took a seat next to me, as if he hadn't just been ignoring me the whole night.  
  
You're really in love, I said vaguely, my expression blank, though I pretended to just be making a statement.  
  
Marco said, a sense of disbelief and wonderment in his voice. I've never felt this way about anyone. It's not just this shallow attraction. You know? I didn't know.  
  
I nodded. After a pause--awkward to me, normal to him--he went on.  
  
Listen, El, he said, finally turning to me and looking me in the eyes. My downward-glancing eyes. Thanks a lot for coming with us here tonight. It means a lot to me...knowing I have some support. He smiled, and the pause seemed to last much longer than the two seconds it had. Especially yours. I smiled only slightly. If I could just tell the truth...  
  
Anytime, Marco.  
  
Dylan returned soon after, and we quickly realized it was getting late. Marco had a strict curfew, and while his parents knew he had a boyfriend, they weren't aware that his boyfriend was in college. Again, Dylan asked if I would drive, and I hesitantly obliged. Another law broken: no one under 18 was supposed to be driving after midnight in the city.  
  
Again, kissing ensued in the backseat, but I was okay with it. In fact, I almost blocked it out of my mind when I noticed I had passed by the same sign twice. I started to get worried; we weren't in the safest part of the neighborhood.  
  
G-guys, I think we're lost, I said, quietly. Too quietly, for they didn't hear. Just as I was contemplating pulling over and calling someone--Marco's parents; my own mother, if I were that desperate--a teenage guy, my age, maybe older, stepped out in front of the car. I slammed on the brake, and Dylan and Marco broke apart. Two more teenagers circled the car, as the one stayed in front. My heart raced, thinking they were going to steal the car, or kidnap one of us, or kill us.   
  
Stay in the car, both of you, Dylan said sternly, before opening the door and stepping out. I feared so much for his life in those moments. He was strong, but if those guys had had a gun...  
  
Marco and I both watched the scene outside in fear. Suddenly the biggest guy pushed Dylan up against the fence. A second later, Marco was reaching for the door handle.  
  
Marco, you can't go out there, I said, on the verge of tears. He'll be fine. I was doing a fairly poor job of trying to keep him calm when I was breaking down myself. He didn't say anything, just looked at me with hurt eyes and got out of the car, not completely shutting the door.  
  
Marco, get back in the car, Dylan yelled right before the biggest guy pushed him to the grass ground by the sidewalk. He did an okay job of defending himself, pushing the guy away and trying to get up. But my heart did flip-flops as the other two guys encircled Marco. He backed up, trying to return to the car.  
  
Where the fuck you think you're going, homo?  
  
Get back here, fag.  
  
They took him and threw him against the broken part of the fence, with its sharp points. I was crying, my eyeliners running down my face as I saw Marco collapse to the ground. They picked him up again and threw him face down into the concrete. I had to call 911. I digged for my cell phone in the backseat. As I did, I heard Marco's cries for help as he was violently kicked all over. My tears flowed down my cheeks quicker than I thought possible, and I just prayed for it be over. But then, the biggest guy pulled a pocketknife out of his hoodie pocket. I saw him lean over both Dylan and Marco, now sprawled out across the sidewalk, and I couldn't watch. When one of the guys saw me sitting in the front seat and walked towards me, I panicked. I slammed on the gas, and drove. When I knew I'd lost them, I frantically searched for my cell phone, and called 911.   
  
After 20 minutes had passed, I went back, hearing sirens from several blocks away. There were several police cars, and a couple ambulances. No families had been contacted, so I was the only one besides police officers and paramedics who were allowed beyond the yellow tape. The first thing I saw was Dylan being loaded into one ambulance. His face was scratched along his temples and chin, one deep gash across his right cheek. He saw me and smiled faintly, as I ran over to him.  
  
Thanks, Ellie, was all he said.  
  
I looked around, hoping Marco's ambulance hadn't already pulled away. It was then I saw another stretcher being carried into the back of an ambulance. But the body was covered up. Like someone had...like someone had...  
  
My mind returned to present day, and a fresh tear drop fell onto my thin paper.  
_  
Don't say I'm out of touch  
With this rampant chaos - your reality  
I know well what lies beyond my sleeping refuge   
The nightmare I built my own world to escape  
  
_A lot of people from Degrassi attended the funeral. Even Dylan, although then on crutches, managed to make it. The whole school seemed shaken up by Marco's death, as big as a school we had. We temporarily had classes that taught us to be accepting of one another, and counseling was advertised often for friends of the victim. I saw Paige go there, and even Spinner and Jimmy occasionally. Whenever these counseling advertisements were made, I felt stares in my direction. People were wondering how it was possible I wasn't attending. They heard the story, they knew I was there that night, they knew I had witnessed it all. What they didn't know was I was healing, in my slow way. Cutting away my arms, feeling the blade against my skin, taking the physical pain, so much easier to deal with than the emotional pain. I'd lost my best friend. Two months passed, and I started to get back to normal. People didn't look at me so weird, and the cutting wasn't so much a necessity as a thing I craved for.  
  
But then I received a phone call.  
  
It was just like any other Sunday night. I was finishing up homework, and my mother laid with her hand over her forehead, having just finished three bottles of vodka, with the TV on quietly. I always liked to keep watch over my mom. Nothing ever really happened, but I liked having someone to worry about at night.  
  
I was just feeling the need to call Ashley to explain the trigonometry homework when the phone rang. I silently hoped it was her, when I picked it up and said faintly,   
  
On the other end, an official, gruff voice greeted mine. Hello, is this Mrs. Nash?  
  
Um, no, I said, confused, tired, wishing people would realize my mother was an alcoholic. And she could never come to the phone. This is her daughter.  
  
Could I please speak to Mrs. Nash, then?  
  
If I said she was busy, they'd probably just hang up. She's...out of town. There was a slight pause.  
  
Excuse me one moment, he said quietly. I heard whispering in the background, seemingly something official being talked about. Ah, yes, this is Eleanor Nash, correct?  
  
  
  
This is Chief Robert Macduff from the Toronto Police Department, the guy said, sounding rather monotonous. We have some important news we were told to deliver to your mother as soon as possible, but we've been given orders to deliver the news to the family in one way or another. We'd ask that you communicate this along to your mother, as quickly as you can.  
  
I said, my mind too tired to process thoughts. Another pause, longer, followed. Another voice picked up in a few seconds.  
  
Miss Nash?  
  
  
  
Miss Nash, I don't know if there's an easy way to tell you this. But I'm sure you're aware of the suicide bombings that have been taking places in the Middle East. My heart pounded jerkily in my chest. Y-your father had taken a day trip into Iraq to calm some of the revolting Iraqi people there, as many men from the peace-keeping troops did. He sighed. Miss Nash, your father was killed today in a suicide bombing along with 6 other men from his group.  
  
I dropped the telephone. I knew it wasn't right not to respond but I couldn't think of way to do so. I never hung up the telephone. I ran to my room and sobbed until I couldn't think anymore. I took the picture of me and him, and I stared at it before throwing it against my cabinet. I grabbed a piece of shattered glass and cut myself several times, until the storm in my mind settled, and blood dripped from me, every drop another piece of my pain, breaking free.  
_  
In my field of paper flowers  
And candy clouds of lullaby  
I lie inside myself for hours  
And watch my purple sky fly over me  
  
_I don't know why everyone thinks I'm so insane. I cut and I function normally, why is it all such a problem for people? So I created a bubble for myself. I let myself live in a fake world where I had friends and I was a good student. It was all rainbows and unicorns for me, living away from the real world, unable to stand it any longer in the hell that had come to surround me. Swallowed up my inner demons, transported to a world where I could smile so innocently, brought there by the blade against my skin. I needed this escape from responsibility, from my alcoholic mother, from my stressful job, from my friends' pressure to see the counselor and the never-ending fake sympathy shoved in my face. It was a feeling of loneliness, a feeling of desperation so indescribable. You were just falling apart from the inside in, the air from your lungs the only reason you'd be considered alive. And you feel as if you laid there, on your bed, rotting away until the end of time, no one would notice. Natural drive to push forward in life and accomplish great things was erased completely. You just want to cut, cut until every drop of blood from your body is gone. Until you can't feel anymore, until you can be that soulless ghost you so need to be. Floating, living, not feeling, not reacting. But I yearn for the noise, for the business to distract myself, to keep myself from caving in and letting my weapon of choice go from razor blade to knife. I just keep cutting, futile attempts to let myself live another day. Life, as advanced and sophisticated as it seemed, was still one big game of survival of the fittest.' This was my method, my evolutionary way to survive in a world full of insane, suicidal people.  
  
The pain continued on.  
_  
Swallowed up in the sound of my screaming  
Cannot cease for the fear of silent nights  
Oh how I long for the deep sleep dreaming  
The goddess of imaginary light  
_  
Pain was not a stoppable thing. I could ease it, I could slow it down, I could even stop a day's worth. But when all my worries from yesterday are gone, today's are already there, ready to destroy what scraps of hope had been created from the day prior. I hadn't slept in weeks, to be honest. Sleep was this easy escape from pain, the weak man's path to sanity. I could keep myself sane in the daytime hours. Marco's death, my father's death, my mother's alcoholism, my friends' fake sympathies. It was all so trivial. I could wish it away, I could go to my imaginary world, I could pretend I was five years old again. But sooner or later, I'd have to face up to this. I'd have to find a way out of this sick cycle. There were ways out. I'd listened to counselors and people at my internship, talking about girls, girls my age, who cut themselves and find their way out. And now they're happy as ever. They don't cut, they don't think these thoughts, they're not even depressed. I can find my way out. Just...let me...call...  
  
I reached for the phone, and found the sharp part of my protracter in my hand instead. I closed my eyes, tears still escaping slowly and steadily, just as my breathing was. Calm, collected, unscared. I brought the tip to the thinnest, most sensitive part of my wrist. I dragged it across, thin skin tearing, feeling a thin but deepset bed of pain. Vermilion blood freely flowed to the top, some settling in the wound, other parts dripping around my wrist. Tears splashed nearby and intermingled with the blood. And as I watched, I admired the shade of red I'd created, and felt my imaginary world return to me again.  
  
Another masterpiece.  
  
_In my field of paper flowers  
And candy clouds of lullaby  
I lie inside myself for hours  
And watch my purple sky fly over me_


End file.
